Bob Menendez hooked up bribe-paying NJ businessman with Qatari officials, new indictment alleges
Scandal-plagued Sen. Bob Menendez was hit with fresh allegations that a wealthy businessman buddy showered him with fancy gifts in exchange for bringing about a real estate investment deal with a Qatar firm.
The superseding indictment filed by Manhattan federal prosecutors Tuesday alleges Menendez, 70, complimented the Middle Eastern government to induce a Doha-linked firm to sign on with New Jersey developer Fred Daibes, whom the lawmaker allegedly introduced to an investor who was also part of the Qatari royal family.
“How about one of these,” Daibes casually suggested in an email that included images of the world-renowned designer watches.
The filing by Manhattan federal prosecutors, which does not include any new charges, extends the timeframe of the bribery allegations against the New Jersey Democrat into 2023 and adds Qatar to Egypt as countries for which Menendez allegedly went to bat to help his friends.
The senator and his wife Nadine were initially charged in September with taking bribes in the form of cash, gold bars and a Mercedes convertible in exchange for assisting Daibes and two other businessmen, Wael Hana and Jose Uribe.
Menendez was subsequently charged the following month with conspiring to act as an agent of the Cairo government, with requests for assistance relayed to the senator through his wife and Hana.
All five defendants have pleaded not guilty.
According to prosecutors, Daibes began paying Menendez in cash and gold bars to facilitate the Qatar deal in 2021. That June, Menendez allegedly introduced Daibes to the royal investor.
Later that summer, Menendez — then the chairman of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee — issued a statement in support of the Doha government as part of a shadow PR campaign on behalf of Daibes, investigators say.
On Aug. 20, 2021, Menendez publicly thanked Qatar for taking in refugees from Afghanistan amid the Biden administration’s cataclysmic withdrawal from that country.
“I am grateful to see our friends and allies in Qatar be moral exemplars by accepting Afghans ultimately seeking safe haven in the US after being forced to escape for their lives,” the statement read in part.
Shortly before the press release went out, Menendez allegedly messaged Daibes: “You might want to send them [the Qataris]. I am just about to release.” Daibes did just that, purportedly relaying the statement to the investor and another Qatari official.
The next month, Menendez and Daibes attended an event hosted by the Qatar government. Days after that, on Sept. 27, Daibes messaged the senator pictures of pricy wristwatches — including a Swiss-made Patek Phillipe — and asked him, “How about one of these.”
The indictment does not say whether Menendez received any of the watches, but the very next day, the Foreign Relations Committee began work on a resolution publicly thanking Qatar for its help with the Afghanistan evacuation.
The measure was approved by the Senate in a voice vote the following May.
On Oct. 17, 2021, Menendez and his wife were given a ride from the airport by Daibes’ driver after returning from a trip to Egypt and Qatar, per the indictment.
The next day, the Garden State Democrat allegedly searched the internet for “how much is one kilo of gold worth.”
In May 2022, the company signed a letter of intent to do a deal with a firm controlled by Daibes, which came on the heels of a dinner meeting involving Menendez and Daibes and the Qataris, prosecutors alleged.
Afterward, Daibes allegedly gifted Menendez one gold bar. On May 26, 2022, Menendez and Daibes met for dinner and the senator later allegedly searched Google for “one kilo gold price.”
Weeks earlier, the indictment claims, the unidentified Qatari official gave tickets to that year’s Formula One Miami Grand Prix to a relative of Nadine Menendez at the senator’s request — a gesture that was repeated this past year by the royal investor. Qatar Airways is a chief sponsor of the racing circuit.
Ultimately, the Qatari company invested tens of millions of dollars in Daibes’ project in 2023.
“The government’s new allegations stink of desperation,” Menendez attorney Adam Fee said in a statement.
“Despite what they’ve touted in press releases, the government does not have the proof to back up any of the old or new allegations against Senator Menendez. What they have instead is a string of baseless assumptions and bizarre conjectures based on routine, lawful contacts between a Senator and his constituents or foreign officials. They are turning this into a persecution, not a prosecution.
“At all times, Senator Menendez acted entirely appropriately with respect to Qatar, Egypt, and the many other countries he routinely interacts with,” Fee added. “Those interactions were always based on his professional judgment as to the best interests of the United States because he is, and always has been, a patriot. This latest Indictment only exposes the lengths to which these hostile prosecutors will go to poison the public before a trial even begins. But these new allegations don’t change a thing, and their theories won’t survive the scrutiny of the court or a jury.”
Menendez has strenuously denied wrongdoing and resisted calls to resign, including from a majority of Senate Democrats and members of his own party in the Garden State.
Should he be convicted, the New Jersey Democrat could face up to 45 years in prison.
Menendez, who was first appointed to the Senate in 2006 and has been elected four times since, previously survived bribery charges on an unrelated matter in 2017 due to a hung jury.
He has not revealed whether he intends on running for re-election, but would face a three-way primary fight with progressive Rep. Andy Kim and New Jersey first lady Tammy Murphy.
The trial in the case is slated to begin on May 6, though Menendez’s defense team has sought to push the case back until after the June 4 primary.
